New Year's Eve: Cee Lo Green Changes 'Imagine' Lyrics to be 'Pro' Religion.

I was watching CNN's New Year's Eve special with Anderson Cooper and Kathy Griffin and at one point, Cee Lo Green starts to sing 'Imagine' by John Lennon. I braced myself for him to change the lyric when it got to the 'no religion too' part and sure enough, he changed it to 'all religion's true'. Really?

No, all religions can't be true, Silly Lo, and why did you feel the need to sing a freethought song by a dead musician, peace activist (and atheist) and then change his lyric? If you feel the need to change the song, why sing it at all? This is disrespectful to the song, its intent and Lennon's legacy—not to mention all non-believers. There's a popular song written by one of our own and religious asshats keep changing its lyrics.

Some theists and shallow-thinkers don't understand the uproar over the annoyance at this, but here's a little history lesson for them...we atheists have been dealing with 'little' changes with much bigger consequences.

How do theists feel about our paper money being restored from 'In God We Trust' back to the original Latin, 'E Pluribus Unem' or 'From Many, One'? The latter message is all-inclusive, where the religious message makes non-Christians and non-believers into second class citizens. Paper money was changed in 1957 and there are still 'clean' dollars to be found as proof. This is just a small phrase, so why do people freak when the attempt is made to restore paper money with its original motto?

Christians even changed the lyrics of our Pledge of Allegiance, as written by Francis Bellamy, a pledge which was originally secular. Now, it is effectively an unconstitutional public school, state-employee-led prayer because Christians added 'under God' in 1954 as a reaction to the Red Scare and McCarthyism. If lyrics aren't a big deal, why is there such resistance to restoring the pledge from the 'under god' version to the original secular version? Why did Eisenhower allow Christian special-interests to change the original secular pledge?

Here is the original pledge as written by Francis Bellamy before it was turned into prayer which makes non-Christians and non-believers into second-class citizens who, if they opt-out, put themselves at risk of castigation and singling-out for special abuse:

I pledge allegiance to the flag
of the United States of America
and to the Republic, for which it stands
one nation, indivisible
with liberty and justice for all.

There's good reason some of us are sensitive to these changes. Our pledge and money are STILL infected with religious dogma from secular, all-inclusive roots—and it hasn't stopped there.

All religions CANNOT be true, but they can all be false.

--

President Obama Was Raised by an Atheist

Despite the claims that Barack Obama is a radical Muslim, he claims to be a Christian and we should take him at his word, unless Christians around the world want to be called 'radical Muslims' too even if they insist on being Christians. By definition, a Christian merely needs to accept the divinity of Christ to qualify, but we know how difficult it is to get two Christians to agree on anything, right?

The more interesting fact here is that Obama's mother, who chiefly raised him during the absence of his father, is an atheist. According to Obama's book where he speaks about his mother's view on religion, she took an anthropological view...exposing him to many different religions such as Buddhism, Christianity and even the Bhagavad Gita, but remained herself a non-believer. Apparently, his father was a non-practicing Muslim as well and possibly an atheist, but it's clear to see the influence Obama's non-believing mother had on him with regard to his wider view on religion and the makeup of American voters.

Why do I say this? Obama is the first president in my 41-year living memory who actually acknowledges non-believers, and more than once. While I never heard him mention our significant majority in his presidential campaign, he did mention 'non-believers' in his inaugural speech, after he was elected. I can understand why he'd be a bit coy about mentioning his support for us until he had won the election, considering he also wanted to attract moderate-Christian voters and atheists are still a hated/misunderstood minority in America.

I am sure President Obama has to know that while non-believers are the fastest growing group among all the religious people in the U.S. We are a compelling audience which most-likely supports Obama among other socially-progressive candidates, and are not likely to be Bush or McCain/Palin supporters.

Obama recognized non-believers in the recent Ft.Hood, Texas tragedy in a recent weekly radio address, "They are Christians and Muslims, Hews and Hindus and nonbelievers."

Yes, we're here and Obama knows it. At last count, conservative estimates place atheists around 16% of the American population, which includes those who self-identify as non-religious or agnostic according to the Freedom From Religion Foundation (FFRF). This sizeable minority outnumbers Catholics, gay, black and Jewish voters. It's a population that a savvy president should not ignore, and it seems Obama is one of the more savvy.

This is a big change from Bush Sr., who had this to say when questioned by atheist radio personality, Rob Sherman;

Sherman: What will you do to win the votes of the Americans who are atheists?

Bush: I guess I'm pretty weak in the atheist community. Faith in God is important to me.

Sherman: Surely you recognize the equal citizenship and patriotism of Americans who are atheists?

Bush: No, I don't know that atheists should be considered as citizens, nor should they be considered patriots. This is one nation under God.

Sherman (somewhat taken aback): Do you support as a sound constitutional principle the separation of state and church?

Bush: Yes, I support the separation of church and state. I'm just not very high on atheists.

Well actually, Bush is wrong (surprise). This is not one nation under god. That national motto and relgious vandalism on our currency was a recent development, only appearing on paper money in 1957, though it was on coins earlier. Before this divisive religious slogan, our money read, 'E Pluribus Unem' which means, 'From Many, One'. This is a much more inclusive slogan for *all* Americans.

In 2012, I suspect that the atheist population will be even bigger, maybe around 18% of Americans or more, especially since today's youth are leaving religion in droves are aren't sufficiently inculcated in the first-place. When nutters like Sarah Palin try to run in 2012 with their Draconian ideas about birth-control and sex-education and lack of science-understanding (evolution) it's not going to go over well.

By 2012, Obama should be able to more-freely support his atheist constituents as he's starting to do now and you can bet they will be voting for him in droves, assuming things go well.

An atheist alone does not a president make, but it sure helps not to have an anti-science fundagelical Crusader like Bush Jr. in office who thinks he's instrumental in Armaggeddon to attain the end-goal of his spiritual fairytale....something which doesn't bode well for any of us.

Thank you, President Obama, for recognizing the fastest-growing segment of the population...atheists (and for putting a science advisor back in the White House). This atheist just asks that you stay on track. It's a good sign that the new Universal Healthcare bill removed coverage for religions woo-woo like faith-healing or other religious 'treatment', but we need to shut down that Stupak Amendment, allowing abortion services to be covered. Abortion is a legal medical procedure and it's not the business of religion. Until religious people actually prove there actually IS a god, they have nothing to say about the real world, since they can't prove any of their claims. That said, abortion is the choice of the female, and it's between her and her doctor, and nobody else.

Let's hope that Palin runs in 2012...it'll be another sure victory for Obama and maybe we can fix some of the issues related to eight years of Bush.

The Out Campaign: A is for atheist.

I've decided to come out of the closet. No, I'm not gay, but some of my best friends are. ;)

Instead, I'm posting on my blog as an atheist, with 'atheist' in the title even though it's visible to prospective clients or employers. Shows to go ya how hated a minority we are when gay people are out without (much) incident, but atheists are still heavily closeted. I am all for equal-rights too and I am glad to see social-progress, but it sucks being in what is likely the world's most- hated minority group.

It's kind of a big deal, because I always have the fear that clients/employers will run screaming from the hills when they discover my atheism, though I'd taken great pains to hide it in the recent past.

The 'Out Campaign' was started by Richard Dawkins as a way to get atheists to come out and be seen, especially by other atheists who might come out as well. This could trigger an avalanche of awareness and acceptance similar to the gay movement. As more atheists leave their hiding places more people will realize that we're everywhere, and that's hard to ignore.

Atheists comprise a huge minority, and the fastest growing one in America. 16% in the U.S. alone are atheists or non-religious which is a staggering 49 million Americans. This outnumbers other minority groups like Catholics, Jews, even black people (not all of you are from Africa, I know). ;) We're your brother, sister, father, mother, friend, doctor, teacher and your video game artists specializing-in but not-limited to characters, specifically modeling and texturing.

Atheists have been so closeted and disorganized that we haven't been able to flex our political might to get merely equal treatment. In the vacuum of oppression, some have stepped in to try and foist religion into government and into our rights, and yes, even the rights of other believers. A better-organized group of un-closeted non-believers would be more effective at resisting religous tyranny, if nothing else, at the grass-roots level, because conversations do change minds (that's how I became an atheist in the first place). But, the first step is coming out. To that end, I urge fellow non-believers to check out Richard Dawkins's Out Campaign.

We're here. We're atheists. Get used to it.


-dB-